Veritech

Projectplace provides full documentation for everything that happens and has happened.Magnus Robbestad, General Manager at Veritech AS

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Auditing and quality management with Projectplace

Magnus Robbestad from consultancy firm Veritech AS is a Projectplace veteran. He has learned that the tool is suitable for a number of different purposes. He uses it, among other things, for auditing and quality management.

Veritech AS offers advisory services and skills development within EHS, quality, environment and management. General Manager Magnus Robbestad is an auditor, and is hired as a consultant for such things as certification processes and audits. In addition he runs his own courses on ISO standards.

Magnus has prominent customers within health, industry and the offshore industry. Veritech has an Enterprise account with Projectplace, and has been using the project management tool since 2003.

“I use Projectplace for everything,” he says. “All types of project I manage are in Projectplace. It’s a fabulously practical project management tool, and over the years I have seen how its user-friendliness has just got better and better.”

Audit for the Norwegian Public Roads Administration

A project can hinge upon so much, and Magnus uses the web-based tool slightly differently from most people, often for auditing tasks. For example, from November 2009 until May 2010, he carried out an internal audit for the southern division of the Norwegian Public Roads Administration, looking at the procedures and results of six contractors with ‘function contracts’ for road maintenance. Magnus travelled round and recorded facts from road projects from Flekkefjord to Rjukan. In addition to the contractors and the people from the NPRA, clerks of works and other parties were also involved. All document reviews, feedback, contacts, reports, and plans of all kinds were entered into the project management tool and sent out to all players for their comments.

“The assignment was both complicated and intensive. With so many different players who were to comment on the reports, it would have been immensely difficult to do this by e-mail. It would have been virtually impossible to keep track of things if it hadn’t been for Projectplace,” says Magnus, who left behind him a highly impressed customer. The clerks of works at the NPRA quickly adapted to the functionality. “I think they also got a taste for the tool,” he says.

Deviation system and quality management

Although Magnus has long experience of Projectplace, there are still modules and some functionality he doesn’t yet use. As far as he is concerned, the document module that deals with everything concerning schedules and documentation is the most important module, but the information tool provided by the start page is the most important feature overall. This is a kind of notice board where you can easily keep yourself up to date with the latest developments in the system and can easily find out more if you want. He also uses the activity module and the archive.

“The archive has a very practical search function that makes it easy to find whatever you are looking for. But I also use the archive as a deviation system for EHS. Here all applications and feedback are logged, and action taken to remedy the deviations is also entered,” explains Magnus, who goes on to say that Projectplace also works very well as a quality management system.

“Once an ISO certification has been completed, you need a quality and environmental management system to be able to follow up compliance with the standards. Although Projectplace wasn’t set up with that in mind, the system meets the requirements for ISO 9001, which covers, among other things, quality management, document control and internal audits. It is, after all, a document management tool that provides full documentation of everything that happens and has happened,” says the consultant.

Complete confidence

Magnus has complete confidence in his project management solution. In all the years he has been using it, he thinks he can only remember one time it didn’t work, but that was because the Internet was down, he adds.

“I’ve worked with a lot of other web-based programs, including e-learning systems. In the early stages of these programs I saw a lot of bugs. That has never happened in Projectplace. It is clear that there are a lot of resources behind every version launched. It is thoroughly tested and I have 100 per cent confidence in the system. I’m not worried about having to back things up either; Projectplace deals with that.”

iPhone and iPad in Italy

One of the things he appreciates most about the project management tool is that it is available on the Internet. This means all users can have access to add documents, keep up with the progress of the project and make comments along the way – no matter where they are or what time zone they are in. As an external adviser, Magnus himself follows several projects from northern Italy, where he and his wife have bought a home and spend a great deal of their time.

“Every spring we spend two whole months there. With Projectplace’s free iPhone app I can read about everything that happens over the course of a day. In the evenings I check my e-mail and can edit the documents via Projectplace. Now I’m looking forward to seeing how it works on iPad,” concludes Veritech’s General Manager.